ObamaCare Is Blocking Job Creation, Economic Growth

On Friday the government will release its unemployment report for April. The jobs numbers last month were a huge disappointment. Americans can't afford more bad news.

Washington needs to break the cycle of weak job growth month after month. To do that, we need to honestly deal with one of the main roadblocks to job creation: President Obama's health care law.

At a press conference this week, the president proved once again that he doesn't understand how his law threatens Americans' jobs, their care and their paycheck.

Whatever the specific numbers are in Friday's report, we know the health care law is weighing down our economy and hurting job growth. We can't allow this frail economy to become the new normal.

Nearly 22 million Americans can't find a job or the full-time work they want. Millions more have quit looking altogether. Now, even more working Americans are seeing their hours cut because of the unreasonable burdens of the president's health care law.

The culprit is a requirement in the law that companies with more than 50 full-time workers provide expensive one-size-fits-all health insurance.

Some small businesses have stopped hiring in order to stay below that number of employees. Others are cutting full-time workers back to part-time status — less than 30 hours a week.

The cuts are happening across industries and across the county. The Federal Reserve reported in March that the health care law is a major concern for businesses.

Employers in the Fed's Richmond district blamed the law for layoffs and a reluctance to hire. Businesses around Dallas reported hiring the bare minimum to get by, due to uncertainty about the health care law. This uncertainty remained a drag on growth in the April Fed report.

The drop in hours and the reluctance to hire are having a ripple effect throughout our economy. Wages are stagnant. Economic growth is anemic.

Just a few days ago, we learned that first quarter GDP increased at an annual rate of just 2.5%. This dismal number is nowhere near what we should be seeing nearly four years after the recession ended.

The economy can't grow until we get Americans back to work. People can't get back to work if there aren't more jobs. Employers aren't hiring because of the health care law.

Unless Washington does something soon, the situation will only get worse. Even a key Democratic architect of the health care law recently said the law's implementation is headed for "a huge train wreck" and that small businesses have no idea what to do.

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